The present invention concerns a waste collecting device intended to equip a vacuum cleaner having a system for separation of the waste of the inertial type or by a cyclone.
Such devices and the advantages that flow therefrom are known: on the one hand an absence of filter bags collecting the waste, bags that it is necessary to change regularly requiring a repetitive purchase of said bags, and on the other hand aspiration conditions that are more constant over time and thus are more favorable to the useful life of the motor and to the effectiveness of the dust removal.
These devices thus generally comprise a shell having an interior tube. The air introduced often tangentially at the interior of the shell follows a helical descending path around the tube while projecting solid particles against the internal face of the wall, these particles then being collected by gravity along the wall in a lower receptacle. At the end of the spiral, air that is liberated from the solid particles rises in the central tube.
The document WO 96/21389 describes a vacuum cleaner of this type that is more elaborate in comprising two cyclones provoked in two concentric casings.
The finest and thus the lightest particles are mainly carried by the flux in the central tube, the centrifugal forces evoked at a higher level playing, with respect to said particles, only a secondary role with respect to the entrainment forces. The majority of these particles do not separate from the air flux and are recovered downstream of the device by means for example of a filter composed of a pleated media.
A residual part of the fine particles is received in the waste receptacle while this fine dust should not be separated by the cyclonic device. This observation can be explained by the fact that one part of the fine dust remains coupled to the more voluminous waste, by mechanical attachment or by surface forces of the electrostatic type. Moreover, when the fine dust is already localized at the periphery of the air flux during its entry into the separation device, the probability of collecting it in the waste container is greater than the probability of a particle of the same size located more axially in the entering flux.
The lower waste receptacle must be emptied regularly. One part of the flow of air having a tendency to penetrate to the interior of the receptacle, this receptacle is often given large dimensions, for the purpose of arriving at storing particles sufficiently far from the flow of air penetrating into the receptacle, in order that the waste is not re-entrained to the exterior of said receptacle. These large dimensions also permit the receptacle to be emptied less often.
According to a simple form of construction, as presented in the document WO 96/27446, the separation device is a vertical cyclonic device, the waste collecting container being then situated under the separation device. Thus, separated waste is accumulated in the lower part of the cyclone, at the level of the inversion of the air flow, and is entrained into the container by inertial projection, the accumulation of waste in the container being aided by gravity, a consequence of the vertical disposition of the cyclonic device.
In other cases, where the separation device is not disposed according to a preferred orientation, such as that described in the document FR 2 778 546, said container is situated on the path of air placed in rotation by the waste separation device. Preferably, the container is situated at the periphery of the separation device, in this case by centrifuging with the aid of a screw, in such a manner that a minimum of air and a maximum of waste are introduced into the container, the waste possibly being halted by a retaining grid. This waste is thus accumulated in the collecting container.
In these two cases, the container has the general form of a box, with or without the presence of a lid.
If, certainly, this separation offers the advantage of freedom from the vacuum cleaner bags of the more conventional appliances, it necessitates however a regular emptying of the waste container.
This operation of emptying and above all of cleaning the waster collecting container is found to be burdensome and incomplete when elements making up the filter device are housed at the interior of the colleting container. Thus, in the document U.S. Pat. No. 5,935,279, the waste collecting container is removable and is provided with a gripping handle. It has, moreover, two separation devices, one with a perforated wall, the other with a cyclonic device, elements that can however be removed from the container for emptying and/or cleaning of said container. These emptying and cleaning operations are thus not very easy to carry out, since they require a disassembly of constituent parts of the receptacle and parts associated principally with separation of the waste.
One of the objects of the present invention is to reduce the problems of handling and complexity of waste collecting containers of the devices of the prior art and thus to improve the comfort of utilization of vacuum cleaners with waste separation of the cyclonic or centrifuging type.
Another object of the invention is to provide the user with a receptacle that can be emptied in a careful and controlled manner while minimizing the quantity of fine dust that escapes and flies around the receptacle and the waste bin.
The present invention is achieved with the aid of a removable waste collecting container separated by a device of the cyclonic or inertial type for a waste collecting appliance of the vacuum cleaner type, said container having several walls delimiting a storage volume, among said walls are noteworthy a wall forming the base of the container, called the base wall, as well as at least one wall provided with an opening, called the link wall, characterized in that:
the base wall and the link wall are contiguous while presenting either a curve of one and/or the other wall, or an inclination between said walls,
the opening of the link wall is located in immediate proximity to the zone of contiguity between said wall and the base wall.
By this inclination or curve between the base and link walls, the container is given the form of a pouring spout, so that it is easy to empty waste through the opening provided in the link wall, an operation facilitated by the location of the emptying opening closest to the base wall.
The user can thus control the exit of the waste by giving an inclination which is just sufficient to allow the dust to begin to slide without reaching a significant speed which would lead to the fine dust, which is necessarily found in the container, becoming airborne.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the removable waste collecting container is in communication over an air path with the waste separating device through the opening of the link wall when it is disposed within the aspiration system.
This arrangement permits the provision of two openings within the container to be avoided: a first to cause the waste to penetrate to the interior of the container, as well as a second opening for emptying the container.
Advantageously, the internal volume of the waste collecting container for storing waste is not provided with any piece, conduit, or device for waste separation.
It is an effect important to note that most of the waste collecting containers have one part of the device for separation of waste, so that the emptying of the container requires either a partial removal of said part, a removal which is distasteful, or the near impossibility of correct cleaning of the container. By making the container removable and with a continuous interior volume, the cleaning of said container is facilitated, as is the convenience of use of the vacuum cleaner.
In a preferred manner, the waste collecting container has a handle situated on one of the walls other than the link wall and the base wall, said handle being located at the outside of the volume defined by said container in order to facilitate gripping of the container.
According to one of the preferred embodiments, the base wall is substantially flat. This flatness permits the speed of sliding of the homogeneous dust to be maintained, minimizing turbulences that are likely to cause the dust to become airborne.
In order to perfect this sliding of the dust smoothly and without turbulence, the base wall is smooth, either by a particular molding, or by a specific surface treatment, including deposition of an non-stick layer such as PTFE.
Advantageously, according to this latter embodiment, the link wall is equally substantially flat, said base and link walls being inclined with respect to one another by an angle of between 40xc2x0 And 70xc2x0. This angular range corresponds to an optimum between the ease of emptying the waste from the container and the bulk of said container.
According to a variant of construction, the container has, outside of the waste storage volume, a conduit for return of purified air. This conduit permits an improvement in overall compactness of the appliance, by avoiding bypassing the waste storage container.
According to this variant of construction, advantageously, the conduit opens:
at one of its ends into the link wall,
at the other end into the base wall.
In a preferred manner, in this latter variant, one part of the wall or walls of the conduit is common with the walls delimiting the waste storage volume, permitting an improvement in material and costs, the common parts being created during the operation of molding of the walls of the container.
Another aspect of the invention concerns a removable waste collecting container such as described previously and having a lid disposed on the link wall, said lid having an opening communicating with the opening of the link wall.
The use of a lid, being able to be open for permitting an easy access to the waste storage volume, improves the ease of cleaning of the walls delimiting said volume.
Preferably, the area of the opening of the lid is at least less than one quarter of the area of the opening of the wall, the zone of coverage of the opening of the link wall being essentially situated toward the zone of contiguity of the link and base walls. Thus, this permits the waste container to be partially obstructed, which facilitates storage of the waste by reducing the opening of the container toward the outside.
Preferably, the lid or a part of the lid is mounted to pivot about an axis that is spaced from the zone of contiguity, in order to facilitate emptying of the container when this latter is inclined toward a dust bin for example, since the lid can then pivot, permitting the waste to fall into the dust bin through the opening present in the link wall and freed by the lid.
According to one of the embodiments, the lid has at least one joint which is peripheral to the openings, on one or the other of its faces, permitting a good seal with the air flow conduits to be guaranteed.
The aim of the present invention is equally a waste separation device of the inertial or cyclonic type for an electrical appliance of the vacuum cleaner type, said device having a first tube presenting an air inlet orifice capable of receiving air that is aspirated and led by the tube, and an air return orifice, a screw positioned in an axial manner in this first tube, a second tube having a diameter smaller than the outer diameter of the screw and situated coaxially in the extension of the first tube, in communication over an air path by one end to the return flow end of the first tube and connected by its other end to the suction group by a first evacuation conduit, a third tube arranged around the second tube and connected to the return flow end of the first tube in a manner to arrange between the second and the third tube a second conduit for evacuation of waste toward a collecting container, characterized in that it has a container as previously described.
By using a device for separation of waste composed of a screw within a particular arrangement of tubes, it is possible to dispose the separation system according to any orientation, as well vertical as horizontal or in an oblique manner.
Preferably, taking into account the inclination between the link wall and the base wall, the screw and the first, second and third tubes are substantially parallel to the link wall of the waste collecting container, facilitating the introduction of waste into the container, as well as the general conception of the vacuum cleaner, avoiding dead zones that would increase the bulk of the appliance.